Have you ever felt a numbness or tingly pain in your leg, lower back, or butt?
It might seem like nothing, but it is certainly a cause for concern, and when it gets very bad, it can affect your day-to-day life and make basic everyday tasks impossible to do.
What is this pain caused by? It comes from what is known as the large sciatic nerve, which is situated on the back of the leg.
Pain from this nerve is referred to as sciatica pain, and it is typically caused by irritation that occurs at the root of the lower lumbar and lumbosacral spine.
Sciatica can also be caused by degenerative disc disease, lumbar spinal stenosis, spondylolisthesis, muscle spasms, and even pregnancy, though the most common cause is a herniated disc or a bone spur.
Sciatica will also manifest more severely in those who do not get regular exercise, are overweight or obese, sleep on a mattress with the wrong firmness, or wear high heels regularly.
Some of the most common symptoms of sciatica involve different types of pain.
This includes pain in the hip, the pain of the lower back, pain on the butt or leg that becomes worse when you sit down, or a constant pain on the rear.
You may also experience a shooting pain that makes standing up difficult, a burning or tingling sensation running down your leg, or a weakness or difficulty in moving your foot or leg.
Typically, sciatica will only affect one side of the body, and usually only the lower half of the body.
Many times, you will feel pain leading from the lower back, passing through the thigh, and moving down the leg, sometimes even reaching the foot and toes.
If you’re someone who experiences this pain relatively regularly, you may want to find a way to relieve it.
There are many yoga poses that can do so slowly, but believe it or not, you can actually help to relieve this pain with the use of an item you probably have at home: a tennis ball!
This is because these balls are able to dig into the muscles and skin, thus easing pain and tension.
All you have to do is lie yourself down on top of a tennis ball, then roll yourself over the ball in an up-and-down motion over the tennis ball so it rolls along your sciatic nerve and the area that is affected.
Compress each specific area for between 15 and 20 seconds, then move along. Use moderate force and pressure as you go.
You can also use more than one tennis ball for this purpose if you experience more severe pain.
If doing this exercise only causes more intense pain, stop immediately as doing this incorrectly can lead to further damage.
The severity of pain can differ from person to person, with some finding it debilitating while others experience it infrequently and find it mainly irritating, but in the latter case, it is likely that sciatica will get worse.
Those who experience weakness in the lower extremities, feel numbness extending to the upper thighs, or feel a loss of bladder and/or bowel control should see a doctor.
SEE ALSO:
Garlic Milk Is The Home Remedy That’ll Give You Relief From Sciatica And Back Pain
